1. Chapter One
2. Inexplicable Bloodthurstiness
3. From The Shadows
4. Black Hole Mystery
5. Power Of Hate
6. The Lust
7. As A Part Of Your Universe
8. Cosmic Terror
9. The Greatest Gift (Instrumental)
10. Warhead 666

Ingar Amlien (vocals, guitar, bass)
Akke-47 - guitars, keys on song 4

Kjetil Hektoen - drums

guest musician: keyboards by Jan Petter Ringvold

review by Boris "Azrael" Witta ___               

Well, where do I start…? Okay, first of all, you need patience in consuming this album. A lot of patience. Because Crest Of Darkness are Progressive. Progressive as progressive can. You have to think about bands like Emperor at the end of their career. And of course it’s clear that the music of Crest Of Darkness contains a lot of different elements, and some of them seem to be unable to fit with the others. On “Evil Knows Evil”, we have influences of course from Extreme Metal in general, then Electro, Ambient, kind of Noise-elements, and Ingar Amlien used to play in a Power Metal-band  called Conception before he started Crest Of Darkness, so there are also some long and expressive guitar-soli. 

All musicians rule absolutely over their instruments and they are able to perform the most complicated part. Ingar Amliens voice is pure Black Metal, high, aggressive and hysteric. To the drummer I have to say that I stopped counting the tempo-changes after two songs, because that’s a sysiphus-work. Also the keyboards are very special, always spacy and industrial in a very special way, and more than once, as listener you get the feeling that – in the first moment – that it doesn’t fit at all, but with the second or the third listening, suddenly it seems to be  good. Strange but true! 

As I said before, there are also some Electro-parts, most of all during noisy intros and some mad “acoustic” parts. The most interesting, the most unconform and most different song is track number six, “The Lust”. Just electronics, confusing samples, a dark voice which speaks insane words, and then suddenly obscure and extreme screaming like in “The Exorcist”, when the evil is talking out of Reagan. Distracting and diffuse. Also drum’n’bass-beats appear in “The Lust” and at the end, something is Marilyn Manson-like feeping. Definitively an adventure for the listener, most of all when he’s a Black Metal-fan! 

During the short instrumental “The Greatest Gift”, you can hear a baby, and I think in coherence with the title, this song has something to do with the fact that Ingar is father of two children. On “Evil Knows Evil”, you mustn’t take one single song and analyze it, that wouldn’t be representative, you have to listen the album as an entire creation. Just one song is special, but special for Crest Of Darkness: The last song “Warhead 666” (cool title by the way!) is very straight, always very fast and pure old-school Black Metal, untypical for the Norwegian trio. It’s very impressive how easy the change from melodic, electronic Black Metal to harsh, aggressive and rough Black Metal seems to be for Crest Of Darkness. But I’m also sure that the band is not going to have an easy live, I think they will have to work hard and they will also have to prove, that they can perform their music(k) live. 

But this band deserves a chance, as listener, you just have to have the patience to discover the band. But if you once discovered Crest Of Darkness, you won’t regret it.

Rating: 7.7/10